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The U.S. House of Representatives voted Thursday to restore funding to most of the Department of Homeland Security, ending a 75-day partial shutdown that had become the longest in American history, with the legislation now headed to President Donald Trump for his signature.
The voice vote, taken without a formal roll call after a brief floor debate, capped weeks of intraparty turmoil that had kept DHS shuttered long after a path to resolution had emerged in the Senate. Speaker Mike Johnson was ultimately forced to use a procedural fast-track maneuver requiring a two-thirds supermajority, a tactic that leaned heavily on Democratic support to compensate for Republicans unwilling to back the measure.
"It is about damn time," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, who had first proposed the bill more than two months ago.
The funding lapse began Feb. 14, after negotiations between Democrats and the White House over new restrictions on immigration enforcement broke down entirely.
The dispute was triggered by the fatal shooting of two U.S. citizens by federal immigration agents during roundups in Minneapolis, which prompted Democratic lawmakers to demand guardrails on enforcement operations as a condition of any DHS funding deal.
Senate Republicans and Democrats eventually struck a bipartisan compromise on April 1, agreeing to fund all DHS operations through Sept. 30 except for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and parts of Customs and Border Protection, which had already received a separate infusion of money through the Republican-only reconciliation bill known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, enacted last year.
That legislation allowed ICE and Border Patrol to continue operating largely unimpeded throughout the shutdown.
The broader shutdown's impact fell hardest on other DHS components, principally the Transportation Security Administration. More than 1,100 TSA agents quit during the funding lapse, and security wait times at major airports stretched to record lengths.
Trump signed an executive order in March directing DHS to temporarily redirect funds to cover TSA paychecks, but Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, a former House member, had publicly warned in recent days that the administration was nearly out of money to continue doing so.
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Even after the Senate passed its bipartisan compromise, House Republicans refused to act for nearly a month. Many conservatives objected that the bill explicitly zeroed out funding for ICE, fearing the optics of being accused of defunding the agency central to Trump's immigration agenda. Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, a prominent hardliner, was blunt in his disdain for leadership's handling of the situation.
"I think this whole thing is stupid," Roy said. "I think it's asinine that we're funding the government this way."
Rep. Jodey Arrington of Texas, who chairs the House Budget Committee, had declared as recently as Tuesday that no votes existed to advance the partial funding bill without immigration enforcement money already secured. "No one is going to vote to fund Homeland without money for ICE and CBP," he said.
At the same time, centrist Republicans were growing visibly frustrated. Rep. Zach Nunn of Iowa, who holds a competitive swing seat, told leadership plainly that he would not leave Washington for the upcoming recess without a resolution.
"This should have been done a long time ago," he said. "I want to see a resolution today to make sure these guys are paid." Rep. Nick Langworthy added that there was "no time to screw around with this anymore," urging colleagues to stop worrying about political scorecards.
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